Oil spills at sea, in lakes, rivers, harbors, marinas or coastal areas are a serious environmental hazard. Wild life, marine life and coastal welfare, including commercial businesses, are at risk with each and every incident.
In responding to an oil spill, critical factors are speed of response and operational efficiency. These factors tend to favour the use of small skimmer-equipped vessels that can be rapidly transported to the area of an oil spill, can work multiple environments (lakes, rivers harbors and at least inshore), and with the use of the latest drum skimmer technology, are reasonably efficient in recovering oil. In contrast, large oil spill recovery vessels generally take longer to respond as they must make their own way by sea to the area of the oil spill, and are operationally limited to deep water. Larger vessels do, however, typically have the capability to sustain their oil recovery operations over longer periods not least because they have much larger storage tanks for recovered oil than can be installed on smaller vessels.
The limited oil storage capacity of many of the current types of small oil spill recovery vessels requires them to periodically cease operation while they transfer recovered oil either to another ship or to a land-based facility. Increasing the size of onboard oil storage tanks has the disadvantage of increasing fuel costs and limiting operational range; furthermore, the use of deck-carried oil storage bladders or tanks has an adverse effect on stability which can be a serious issue at sea. Using a floating oil storage bladder directly coupled to the oil recovery vessel, is also not a good solution as it severely restricts maneuverability.
Although modern skimming equipment is very efficient, a small percentage of water is still picked up with the recovered oil. Storage of this water along with the recovered oil represents a reduction in oil storage capacity and increased fuel costs, that is, a reduction of operational efficiency. It is therefore desirable to provide onboard oil/water separator equipment to remove the remaining water before the recovered oil is stored.
It is an object of the present invention to provide an oil/water separator suitable for use onboard an oil spill recovery vessel.